Building Permits for New Housing Units in Austria

After sharp declines in two consecutive years, WIFO's building permit forecast also expects a further drop in 2022. The forecast values are 53,600 units, which corresponds to a decline of 5.2 percent compared to the previous year. The construction of detached and semi-detached houses still benefitted from the pandemic-related increase in demand in 2021 – at 20,800 units, the highest value since 1980 was reached – but will not be able to increase further according to the forecast. Slight declines of –1.0 and –1.5 percent are forecast for 2022 and 2023, respectively. Multi-storey construction, where the declines of recent years have been concentrated, continues its downward trend in 2022 (–7.6 percent) before stabilising in 2023 (+1.3 percent). The overall level of building permits is forecast to remain above 50,000 units.